


Start Over

by hit_the_books



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Betaed, Coda, Episode: s11e02 Form and Void, Established Relationship, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M, Missing Scene, Multi, Wincestiel - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-22
Updated: 2015-10-22
Packaged: 2018-04-27 15:05:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5053420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hit_the_books/pseuds/hit_the_books
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No more secrets. No more saving just their own necks.</p><p>But will Sam be able to rebuild what he once had with Dean and Castiel?</p><p> </p><p>  <em>Set during the unseen car ride back from Superior to the Bunker in s11e02 Form and Void.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Start Over

**Author's Note:**

> Big thanks to my beta reader [Zeryx](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Zeryx/pseuds/Zeryx) for all of her help on this.
> 
> Find the story on Tumblr [here](http://dreamsfromthebunker.tumblr.com/post/131702174180/start-over).

Would Superior ever recover? Dawn is shifting onto the horizon as Baby pulls up beside the hospital and Sam takes a tentative step outside, but Sam feels like he’s stepping out into a ghost town already. The streets are devoid of the living. Sam’s eyes fall upon the feet of a small girl, just sticking out from behind a nearby car, all shiny red shoes and frilly, bloodied-white socks. There’s an upside down parasol that’s yet to be shifted by the elements and blown away. Did the outside world know that Superior was gone? That an entire town had disappeared in a day? A lack of any federal response suggested no one else knew that an entire town had just carved itself up piece by bloody piece.

Sam had cured three groups of infected before Dean called to say he was almost there. Sam knew those people wouldn’t be coming back. The survivors had run out of Superior the first chance they had. They would have run right past that little girl behind the car. Had they seen the monstrous work Sam had allowed to be cut into the world? The blood on her socks is brown, but Sam sees it glistening red for a moment, his head aching dully.

Nothing has changed , so far as the birds singing in the trees are concerned. Baby’s engine rumbles along beside their calls.

‘Course things have changed. Too much in fact. If Sam listens close enough to the deep vibrations of Baby’s engine it almost syncs up with the dirge in his heart. The harrowing tune had been on a loop since Dean was killed by Metatron. For a moment back in that bar on the edge of town it had started to subside. Now a new note had been added and further twisted the low and mournful set, pulling Sam’s nerves apart.

There’s hope now, the cured are hope, but Sam’s finding it hard to hold onto. It’s hard to be ecstatic and hopeful when you’ve saved your brother and doomed the world in one move--leaving blood where it had no right to be.

Dean rolls down his window. “You just gonna stand there, c’mon!”

Shaking his head, Sam strides round the back and stows his gear in the trunk and slides into the front passenger seat.

“Hey, any more word from Cas?”

The window rises up again and Dean shifts the Impala out of park and into first. “Damn number keeps going to voicemail.” There’s worry in his brother’s voice; Sam edges closer to Dean as they pull away from the ruined hospital.

“Sam, you’d tell me if something was wrong, right? That whole song and dance back there the other day wasn’t just for the hell of it. You’d tell me if something had happened?” Dean casts a sideways glance at Sam and yeah, of course Dean is bringing up his speech.

Saving people means all of the people. Those had been Sam’s words to Dean and he’d implied that they needed to talk to each other, not hide things. Stop themselves from barrelling into a world of hurt and apocalypses through lies and misdirection.

Sam has to stop himself from looking at Dean’s face and giving himself away. “Of course I’d tell you.”

“Good.” Dean’s eyes settle back on the road. Sam risks a look at Dean and feels his stomach tighten. No, there is no point in telling Dean about what had happened in that closet, how close Dean had come to losing him.

No point in telling him right now of Billie’s promise that their asses were heading to the “Empty” the next time they died. That their get out of jail cards had officially run out and they would cease to exist the next time Death came a-knocking. Amara was in the wind and Jenna was dead; Dean had called to say that, so there was no point in laying anything else on him right now. No need to mention the vision. He’d told him of the cure and let them have that win.

Sam tucks himself closer to Dean.

“What, you’re gonna go all octopus on me now?”

“Didn’t have the chance earlier. Anyway, I won’t do anything too distracting. Not yet.”

“We’ve got plenty of time.”

Sam’s breath catches for a moment. Time is perhaps the one thing they really don’t have any more. “You haven’t let me… hug you since…” He licks his lips. Since you killed Cain.

For more than a year, Dean had just cut things down to aggressive fucking and long mean stares, well while he was human. If Sam had wanted a hug or a kiss, he went without. When Cas and he had begun to work together to remove the Mark, Sam went to Cas and Cas to Sam. They’d been holes to Dean and all tenderness had seemingly left him the moment he wanted physical contact that wasn’t sticking someone with a blade.

The muscles on Dean’s neck visibly tense. “I know. I just-”

Lowering his left arm over Dean’s shoulders, Sam gives his older brother a squeeze. “I missed you… we’ve missed you.”

Just holding his arm over Dean’s shoulders, being this close to him, was more affection than Sam had been permitted to show in months. A lack of murderous side eye was enough to tell Sam that he was allowed this now.

There’s no reply from Dean, just a resigned nod. It’s only a short drive back to Lebanon, no more than hour to reach the Bunker.

Sam tries Cas’s phone again and it just goes to voicemail. “Where do we even start?” Sam asks as he hangs up the call. “He’s-”

“Look, we’ll get back to the Bunker and figure this out!” Dean snaps.

The long arm around Dean’s shoulders starts to pull away. Right hand flinching up from the steering wheel, Dean grabs the sleeve of Sam’s light olive-beige jacket.

Dean doesn’t mean to snap, but he’s sleep deprived and spent more than twelve hours already travelling between Cedar Falls and Superior. He’d let Sam drive if he didn’t think his little brother looked about as tired as he did. Sure, it was just another fortyish minutes back to the Bunker if they didn’t hit traffic or hordes of rabids, but at least they would have what they needed to find Cas there. The back of Baby wasn’t exactly bustling with case research materials at this time.

“I didn’t mean it like that, Sammy… Sorry I snapped.” Dean wants that hug. Wants to feel the reassurance of having Sam beside him, the weight of his arm on his muscles.

The past two days had been the first time in a long time that Dean had felt free. Free of an addiction that had been slowly killing him. Under the influence of the Mark of Cain, the stream of bodies that Dean had cut through had been like the tih, tih, tih of a morphine drip, cooling the gnarling, twisting pain from the Mark, and calming the near constant urge to puke his guts out. And now it was gone and he could feel his skin, his thoughts, his wants, his desires coming to life again.

A sigh slides out of Dean the moment Sam rests his arm back around him. Eyes on the road, Dean only sees a faint hint of movement out of the corner of his eye and then he feels Sam’s lips brushing up against the scruff on his right cheek. The kiss is light and sweet.

“You missed us?” Sam looks back towards the road.

“You were never gone.”

“You know how I mean, Dean… Handling you with the Mark and trying to be close to you with it there wasn’t-”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” Dean grimaces. His mind tracks back to the nights he called outside Sam’s locked door and was met with silence; when his drink slurred words made demands. Sam had touched him a few times when he’d been in that state or let himself be touched, but they’d lost sight of what they had. No lazy Sunday lie-ins that weren’t that lazy. No slow morning showers together. No teasing each other apart piece by piece after a night at a local bar. No leaning against each other as they watched Game of Thrones season two.

“Do you want to take things slow?”

“Do you?” Dean can feel Sam’s eyes on him.

“I wanna wind the clock back four years and start from there again.”

“What, so we can deal with Dick all over again?”

“So, I can pull you back from him in that lab.”

No Purgatory. Dean thinks about that for a moment. It would have been good, but it wouldn’t necessarily have stopped the Trials, the Fall, Gadreel, the Mark...

“For Cas it’ll be more like six.” Dean says bitterly.

“Maybe we should start over.”

“Need to find the son of a bitch first.”

The large hand on Dean’s left shoulder squeezes him in reassurance. “We’re gonna find Cas… and then we’re gonna sort out our mess.”

Our mess. Dean holds back the words he’s already said before. There’s no point in divvying out the blame and he knows this, no point in scraping over old wounds and re-opening them. How are any of them going to heal and get through this if they’re constantly living in the past? Dean knows they stand no chance if they keep cutting themselves open. Not that this means he won’t think about it now and again when he’s two shots away from the bottom of a bottle of Jack late at night.

A pinkish-red dawn sky greets them as they roll through the town of Lebanon and head up towards the Bunker. The town looks normal, just like it always has. Compared to Superior it’s paradise.

Pulling up outside the Bunker, not wanting to risk Baby in the mess that had been left inside, Dean puts the Impala in park. Sam’s arm is still around him and his brother is looking nervously at the damaged doorway.

“Hey, Sammy, look at me.”

Sam turns to face him and Dean slowly leans in, giving him a chance to back away if he wants; he doesn’t. Closing the distance, Dean tenderly presses his lips against Sam’s. Dean uses his lips to test and reassure, gauging where the two of them now stand with each other. The kiss ends when the two pull away, leaning their foreheads together and catching their breath. Sam’s giving Dean his puppy dog eyes and Dean allows himself a smile.

“Let’s start over,” Dean asks.

“Sounds like a plan.”

Easing away from each other, the two of them climb outta Baby and grab their duffels from the trunk. Neither knew they were minutes away from having their hearts gripped by panic and fear again, their feet carrying them through the destruction left by the Stynes. Didn’t know how much it would take to put things back together and start afresh.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this please let me know :)
> 
> You can find me over on Tumblr at [Dreams from the Bunker](http://dreamsfromthebunker.tumblr.com).


End file.
